Faith Works 6-13-20 & 6-20-20

Faith Works 6-13-20

Jeff Gill

 

Communion is togetherness

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Among Christian churches, communion is an act with deep and vast meaning.

 

Deep in time, going back to the upper room in Jerusalem where Jesus had a last meal with his disciples, and deeper still as they were sharing a Passover meal together, which has roots in the bread of haste and the cup of God's blessing shared by the Israelites as they prepared to leave Egypt.

 

Had you ever thought about that? A communion observance takes us on one level back to one place, but it goes across more boundaries to get to that meal eaten in homes and under cover of darkness, behind closed doors, waiting on the Angel of Death to Passover, not to mention the Egyptian oppressors.

 

And how might even that meal trace to Joseph and his brothers, those whose names gave the tribes of Israel their labels, coming into Pharaoh's realm and finding eat and drink in that unexpected place.

 

Or even earlier, in Genesis 14, when Abraham (well, Abram then) and Melchizedek, ruler of Salem, sit down together with bread and wine blessed by this mysterious priest and king.

 

Communion is important. Some call it a symbol, and I'll just let you look up what Flannery O'Connor said about that, but she had strong feelings about the meaning and reality of communion.

 

That importance is guarded, in many churches, by restricting the preparation and blessing and giving of communion to a certain group of people, often those we call "ordained." To have a sacramental, a truly sacred act of communion, some hold, you need to have a presider who is duly ordained and has the standing to do so.

 

This is why the whole period we're going through is so difficult in many faith traditions. If your faith and practice say that communion calls for a presider with certain qualifications, it's not really proper to do "online communion" as some are doing.

Now, I speak from an interesting crease in reality. I am ordained, and a proper presider I have been in many traditions; I have learned over the years what the rules are for communion and how to follow or work with those guidelines in many traditions, as I've done guest preaching in a variety of places. "When in Rome, etc."

 

But my own tradition holds to what's sometimes called "lay presidency," which is a fancy term for saying a lay person can preside at our communion table, for formal worship or in any circumstance. And let me note: some very formal traditions have interesting exceptions under certain circumstances, so you'd be surprised who "can" do communion in certain traditions. But that's a very long essay for elsewhere.

 

In lay presidency at the table, a youth can preside for a special Sunday, any elder can stand at the table of Jesus and share his words of institution from Scripture, deacons can lead a Last Supper on a mission trip or in a home. And we can invite people to watch us as clergy leading worship online to have communion at home, saying that any believer can preside at their own table, and we are (often on tape) guiding them through the act of remembrance.

I want to be very clear: for those who hold to a high view of communion and the sacraments, that's not a path that's open to them in those traditions. And I respect the intention and the implementation of their restrictions. What it does create, though, is confusion among some everyday worshipers, who wonder why their neighbor can "do communion" at home along with the video on their tablet on the kitchen table, and they have to wait.

 

And even in those more liturgical traditions, many are limiting or restricting how they "do communion" such as with bread only, or other ways to manage the contacts and exposure to potential infection . . . which most churches have done in the past, as well, when bad flu seasons ripple across the country, or even in a particular building when a rotavirus hits the congregation. We've all been here before, even if it's not often, and there are many work arounds.

 

My prayer is that we all use this time to reflect on what it is about communion that ties us to each other, and to God; how we are used to participating, and how changes can help us appreciate and reflect on the act of remembrance and relationship and being truly "in communion."

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's presided over many communion services in some pretty interesting places. Tell him where communion has been important to you at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

 

 

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Faith Works 6-20-20

Jeff Gill

 

Or, you could read your Bible
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So many of us miss worship and fellowship and friendship and being physically and personally present to each other. That's a very real loss, and it's a pain which we will be doing physical therapy to recover from for some time to come!

 

I really mean that. This period of restriction and limitation is a wound, and while there are many opinions out there about how necessary or how long it should have been, or even will yet be in some churches, it has been a wound, a nearly physical injury. If it has been a necessary cut, like a surgeon's incision, I'd point out that I don't think recovery times are that different for a sixteen stich injury whether it was done for an operation, after an accident, or done by an attack. It still needs healing.

 

We will need healing from this period, long after it ends. Whenever it ends. However long it has to go for some of us. We will need healing. It has hurt to be apart, and we will not just be able to put a small butterfly dressing on the injury and blow on it. We will need healing.

 

So whether your church is "back in the building" or driving up to it outside or just watching those wonderful if not entirely satisfying video services, can I tell you how we people of faith can start working on our healing and helping and physical therapy it will take to get the body back into shape?

Read your Bible.

 

Yeah, big shock from a Christian preacher, ain't it? But I'm talking about really reading it, for one thing, not glancing at a couple of key verses and freelancing from there in your own head; I'm also talking about reading some extended passages that are relevant to our current experience, from the historical record, yes, but also under the guidance of the Holy Spirit that gave us this Word.

 

So read your Bible back in Genesis, from chapter 37 through 50. Read how Joseph was torn from his homeland, found a new home, and ended up making a safe place not only for his beloved brother and father, but for the brothers who intended to hurt him. He was apart, and then the Spirit of God made reunion and healing possible.

 

Read your Bible in Exodus. Oh yeah, you know where I'm at now, right? From chapter 3 to . . . oh my. How far should you go? All the way through Deuteronomy? How Moses leads the people after God commissions him at the burning bush on Sinai out of Egypt and into the wilderness; how the people Israel long for where they had been, but are tested and tried and sifted with the desert sands until they are ready for a new home, a new way to be together in the land of promise.

 

Or you could jump ahead and read the book of Ruth. Don't be shy, she only asks four chapters of you. Four! You can do this. She is not from around here, but she comes in out of love and faithfulness, and in our familiar place she makes for her self a home. She is a stranger and sojourner, out of Moab, into a Hebrew land, and she becomes a part of the family, an ancestor of the Most High, of Jesus himself.

 

You could, you know, read the Book of Hebrews. Where the unnamed author or authors in the Pauline tradition talk to the Jewish Christians of their own family, now exiled again from Israel, and walks them through a form of healing and reunion that allows them to carry much that is of value, but not more than they can bear, so they can anticipate a house not made with human hands.

Or just read the end of the book or books, as many do before going back and reading the whole mystery or adventure or whatever volume they've picked up: jump to Revelation, chapters 21 & 22. I'd hope you could at least go back to chapter 19, attend the wedding supper of Christ and the church, and see how the plan is for all to be a celebration, marked with healing and hope and eternal joy. If you read ALL 22 chapters, you'll note it's not all joy all the way through. But we'll get there.

Or you could just read John 16:33. Jesus says "In this world, you will have troubles." Truer words there may not be in the Bible. But the next words Jesus says:

"But take heart; I have overcome the world."

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in central Ohio; he's impatient, too, about a great many things! Tell him how you are working on your own healing and recovery from separation at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

 

Notes From My Knapsack 6-11-20

Notes From My Knapsack 6-11-20

Jeff Gill

 

Opening up, holding back

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With the ever-loosening state "stay-at-home" orders and business restrictions for health reasons, it's easy to see the debate sorting into two polar opposites: hunker down longer, or open it up completely, now! And you can certainly find adherents of either extreme in both everyday discourse and official perspectives.

 

But on coronavirus restrictions I think a person can, and do myself have three thoughts at the same time. I don't own and operate a business, but I do have responsibilities for a faith community, and the question of "opening up" has gnawed at people like me almost every day since mid-March, for congregations as much as commercial establishments.

 

What I've never felt was the either/or angle on this. It just hasn't seemed like all or nothing, even if that's what social media and cable news can make you think.

 

There's what the state restrictions officially are, and yes, churches are exempted from most of them, but even there we have strongly urged recommendations from the officials, along with what are mandated guidelines for comparable buildings and events. So I keep that in mind.

 

Then there's what I personally think. That's complicated, and changes over time, but I have my own developing sense of what's absolutely necessary, what's helpful, and what's probably not needed . . . in my opinion. There are websites and databases I trust, and information sent me by well-meaning friends and associates which I reserve the right to view skeptically. But it's all, on a certain level, just Jeff's opinion. Which is just that, opinions and not facts, and they're part of how I adapt my own behavior, but not an iron rule for all.

 

The third is how I handle the previous two categories in light of my immediate official setting, which has its own demographics and physical limitations. What I'd do if I were in a different building layout, or with a different audience in terms of age and other factors, is beside the point. We are a particular faith community in a specific structure, and the layout is what it is.

 

Given those three intertwined lines of thinking, I can perfectly well celebrate and encourage some churches doing things quite differently than I am recommending or practicing in my own situation. Just because one faith community is open and operating and another isn't doesn't mean one has to think the other is wrong, and vice versa. I've seen and heard some recklessness that worries me, but mostly people are being cautious, and careful, and we'll all watch the data over the next few weeks and see what rises or falls.

 

And I may think later I was too cautious in this season. That's perfectly possible. But that prospect is far less worrying to me than later wishing I'd been more careful, and realizing after it was too late I'd helped harm others by my haste. It's a larger, slower moving version of the internal debate I have every time I push hard on my accelerator in the car. Rarely do I think later "drat, should have floored it." That's where I'm at right now.

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he tends to drive pretty close to the speed limit. Tell him where you are drawing lines and taking precautions at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

 

Faith Works 6-6-20

Faith Works 6-6-20

Jeff Gill

 

Racism and our own history

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I'd love to walk away from racism. It would be pleasant to not have to talk about it, or deal with it . . . and as a white male, I could in many ways, ways that friends who are people of color cannot.

 

But here's the thing. My ways of de-stressing and getting away from the pressures of day-to-day life as a minister are history & archaeology & nature. So I go to pull up some early Licking County narratives out of the records, and turn to one of the classic sources, Edwin Brister's 1909 "Centennial History of Newark and Licking County."

 

He heads a chapter "The First White Men in Licking County" and opens it with the words "Following the Mound Builders and the Indians came the superior race to occupy the soil of Licking County." Even allowing for shifts in terminology over a century and more, the framing of the chapter is jarring, and the simple impact of the words "came the superior race to occupy" jolts me even now, having read past that opening many times. Also making me wonder what other less blatant biases are filtered into my thinking as I thumb through this necessary early source.

 

And you may or may not notice the subtle jab about distinguishing between "the Mound Builders and the Indians." That's intentional: the racially tinged viewpoint that the ancestors of modern Native American Indians could not have build the earthen geometric enclosures of Ohio left a "Moundbuilders myth" that's still hard to lay to rest, whether it takes root in the ten lost tribes of Israel, Vikings, wandering Romans, or Welsh princes.

 

Oh. Welsh princes. I have a many years long fascination with Chaplain David Jones, a primary shaper of the Euro-American settlement of Licking County from his 1773 journey through our valleys for the first time to his last visit in 1820. I've found some new letters from his hand, echoing his original manuscript, a copy of which was in Thomas Jefferson's personal library; he makes it clear that any time he meets an intelligent or articulate Shawnee or Wyandot person their better qualities are always Welsh. He's convinced that there's Welsh blood in the finer native people he meets, and their language is rooted in his native Welsh tongue . . . but is continually disappointed in his attempts to preach to them in that language.

 

And I go for a much needed walk this afternoon, and a few hundred yards from my home, a stone marking the death of one of those early settlers in 1802, people directed here by Chaplain Jones, which has displayed along a busy road for nearly a hundred years not only that sad death, but how before Lilly Jones died she gave birth to "The First White Child Born" in the township. I'm not saying racism was the whole intent in 1938 when it was placed, but that you start to see in the historical record, especially after the Civil War, how "white" becomes an important category and a distinct marker of status.

 

Thanks to my dad, I often relax by reading Civil War history, and . . . well, do I have to spell it out for you? But sometimes, as I read about, say, the Vicksburg Campaign (and think "wow, Dad will really enjoy this one" then pause, and go back to reading), and the depth of the racial injustice that got us here just shakes me, the end result of that conflict notwithstanding.

 

This isn't even getting into my equal passion for and professional understanding of how congregational and church history more broadly is an active force in today's debates over polity and process and planning . . . echoing Faulkner's "The past is never dead. It's not even past." This has led to an ongoing and unpleasant if necessary project in unearthing and unpacking of the role the 1920s Ku Klux Klan played in the history of our county, my church, and across the Midwest and beyond for many church bodies that would be shocked today to realize how complicit their ancestors once were.

 

So I could kid myself, and walk away from racism. It would require lots of strategic seeing and not-seeing, evasive action and outright denial. The kinds of choices racism depends upon. So I can't escape it, even as a white male. I can only choose how to confront racism today, how to try and understand it, and learn in community how to take it apart into its constitutive elements (one of which is sin, of course) and then be able to discard that which is corruption and decay, and preserve what we need to remember.

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's been trying to come to terms with how racism is a part of the sin that besets us for many years, and he's not done yet. Tell him how you are working for racial reconciliation at knapsack77@gmail.com or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

 

 

Faith Works 5-30-20

Faith Works 5-30-20

Jeff Gill

 

Pentecost and the idea of Jubilee

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With this Sunday the end of Eastertide in many Christian churches, and that festival for even more being Pentecost, there are many who can see the roots of that name, pentagon and pentathlon and the concept of five or in this case fifty.

 

Pentecost marks, actually, 49 days after Easter Sunday, and in England "Whit Monday" is a holiday as it is in much of Europe; the whole period inclusive of Easter to Pentecost is fifty days, itself an echo of a pattern of seven weeks and fifty day periods in the ancient rabbinic calendar of Israel.

 

And behind those sets of fifty day periods in the year, is a tradition witnessed in the Torah and Writings of Hebrew Scripture, the Christian Old Testament, of seven times seven years, forty-nine of them, being followed by a Year of Jubilee.

 

One of the hints of this idea in ancient Israel is also on America's Liberty Bell, where on one of the bands is the citation Leviticus 25:10, "proclaim liberty throughout the land to all the inhabitants thereof." Because that's what a Jubilee in principle was, a time of freedom and release.

 

Biblical scholars still debate this, but there's more evidence of the idea of a Year of Jubilee than there is that one ever happened, and sadly you can see why. The cycle of seven days with a Sabbath for rest, seven weeks and a feast or celebration or observance like Pentecost, and then the seven years times seven was a culmination of these cycles believed built into creation for our good, for the blessings of humanity and all the earth – to cancel debt, to release slaves, to set free peoples. Even the land would be "freed" in a Jubilee year, with no planting or harvest. With the trumpet blast on the shofar, the ram's horn, the "jubilee" sound would tell everyone in God's realm that freedom would reign, and secular matters would be reset, from the highest rulers to the lowliest people.

 

In the ancient and medieval world, this was not as exotic an idea as you might think. It was common when a king or queen would die for prisoners to be released and commercial debts to be canceled, a dramatic sign of transition and reaffirmation of divine providence. A jubilee of sorts.

 

This year, as Pentecost and the Sundays after it come, we are leaving behind a strange sort of jubilee – stimulus checks in the mail, jobs lost and found, closures resulting in bankruptcies and permanent shutdowns, and at home and personally, many are finding this has been a season for reassessment. What do we really need or use, first in the fridge and freezer, then in the pantry, and onwards into closets and cupboards and even basements.

 

In no way do I want to minimize the disruption and pain many have experienced since mid-March. It's been a very hard time, and I'm painfully aware of that myself. But the reason even ancient Israel never observed the intriguing concept of a Jubilee Year is likely because it's a painful path to seek blessing, and it would take strength and commitment on the part of rulers to stay the course – canceling debt, freeing prisoners, resting the land and living off of the built up reserve. The pain would not, as it has not, fall evenly across the people. The pressure to get back to "normal" was and is strong.

 

Yet I look at much of the winnowing and sifting that's been happening, and is still going to occur, all around us. Quite a few businesses closing or declaring bankruptcy were on the way out already, this just sped the day. There are going to be churches and charities that will not survive, but I doubt it will be just because of the coronavirus restrictions alone. Camps and ministry programs will end with the blame put on COVID-19, but was that really the whole story?

 

The truth is we need a Sabbath, and not just each week. We need those pauses in our lives that give us time and space to reassess, and not just to clean out closets. And if we don't choose to take them, the cosmos and the Creator has ways of imposing on us that discipline, in hopes that we will ultimately choose to rest, and reflect, and renew.

 

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's not always good at resting himself, but God has a way. Tell him about how the Lord blows a horn and a halt for you sometimes at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.